Interesting Times For California Republicans

Dick Riordan had a rough weekend at the California Republican convention. He lost the straw poll, was booed several times, has received numerous negative endorsements from many party luminaries, and was stalked by a guy in a rhinocerous costume, symbolizing his perception as a RINO (Republican In Name Only). George Deukmajian (former governor) has stated flat out that he will not support a Riordan candidacy.

Bill Simon, who won the straw poll, is coming on strong. He’s getting some key endorsements, and he’s got plenty of his own money. People have been predicting another potential Bloomberg-like win here, with the liberal Riordan running as a Republican of convenience, but I think it’s looking less and less likely that he’ll get the nomination. Party activists tend to be much more conservative than the even the registered Republican voters, especially in California.

And if he does, I fully expect to see a third-party movement spring up, led by Mr. Simon. It’s not clear to me whether he’d pull more votes from Riordan or Davis…

Daschle Senate Control Looking Shaky

Bad news for Tom Daschle. The Senate Plurality Leader is looking more and more likely to become the Senate Minority Leader next fall.

As one bit of evidence, consider this story from the Minneapolis Star Tribune that shows Paul Wellstone in a neck and neck race with his Republican opponent. When an incumbent can only poll forty five percent, it looks pretty grim. Undecideds have more of a tendency to ultimately go to the challenger.

And loss of the Senate to the Republicans would be particularly sweet, considering what it would do to His Pomposity, Jim Jeffords.

Leonardo Who?

According to this article in the New York Daily News, our president is culturally challenged. In fact, if you can believe this, he doesn’t even know who Leo DiCaprio is.

Horror of horrors!!

How did we come to such a state, to have our country led by someone so out of touch, so…uncool? Even wooden Al Gore must have known that.

Bill Clinton might have subverted justice, rented the Lincoln Bedroom, sold pardons and foreign missions and nuclear secrets, and bought votes, and ignored terrorism, but, by God, at least he was hip!

If only we’d known this back in November 2000…

Get That Man Some Dippity Doo

It may be a busy weekend, and I don’t know if I’ll have time to post much. But in the meantime, check out some of the superlative links to the left, and marvel at the man who, according to the Guiness record people, has the world’s longest ear hair. I think that beats a monkey picture any day of the week, and twice on Saturday.

So What?

…is what I say to this article bemoaning the lack of “racial mix” in our winter Olympic team. Even if there really were such a thing as “race,” there is no rational reason to suppose that every activity in which people partake will, or should, have exactly the same racial or gender composition as society at large.

Everybody Does It

An article in today’s Chicago Tribune tells a tale of a teacher who lost her job over upholding academic standards. After warning her students that they would get no credit if they didn’t do their own work on their course project, several of them plagiarized anyway. When she attempted to follow through, she was undercut by the school board. Now she’s given up, and is doing day care.

I think that this is just a continuation of the deterioration of our society’s ethical base that became so clear in the Clintonized nineties. And it’s an indictment of the school system as well–a school system that, under insane “zero tolerance” policies, will expel a child for heroically taking a knife away from someone attempting suicide, or who accidentally brings a plastic spork in his lunchbox, but has abundant tolerance for students who cheat (and who are cheating themselves, as well as their classmates).

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!